


risk and reward

by fraud



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: M/M, Making Out, Underage Kissing, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-13
Updated: 2013-11-13
Packaged: 2018-01-01 10:03:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1043519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fraud/pseuds/fraud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dick makes a promise, and Damian intends to hold him to his word.</p>
            </blockquote>





	risk and reward

**Author's Note:**

> Damian is of an unspecified age, but think D:SoB if it helps. This is my contribution to dD week- Day 2: Dick & Damian! x-posted from tumblr

Chaos erupts the moment they push through the gala’s exit doors, frantic flashes exploding on every side like hundreds of dropped flash bombs and hands reaching to brush against their arms, their elbows, cajoling for a comment, shouting for a smile, pleading for one last pose. Alfred ushers them into the backseat, behind the safety of windows tinted so dark the chance of seeing past is an impossibility, and shuts the door with an annoyed snap.

The relative silence that follows is deafening; a moment of palms on plush leather, of fabric shifting against skin, the chase of one inhale following another’s exhale. One last burst of outside noise as Alfred slides into the drivers seat, and the shutter clicks are reduced to muted raindrops bouncing off the sleek black exterior of the Wayne town car.

As is expected, Dick is the first to chip away at the silence with a breathless chuckle.

“They never get tired of the ambush, do they?” He asks, pushing a hand through his hair, his entire body following the movement until he’s relaxed against the firm back of the seat.

“It would seem not, Master Richard.” Alfred replies, mostly because professionalism dictates he not sigh. There is the click of a key sliding home, followed almost immediately by the purr of the engine brought to life. “Homeward bound then, young sirs?”

“I dunno Alf, the night’s still youn-“ Dick’s answer is cut off with a hand shoved forcefully in his face.

Scowling at his mentor, Damian dispels any bright ideas Dick might have had waiting in the wings. “To the Manor, Pennyworth.”

Both boys can see Alfred’s eyes in the rearview mirror’s reflection, patient albeit obviously expecting some form of agreement to be forthcoming from the backseat.

Dick presses the flat of his tongue firmly against Damian’s palm and licks, the younger boy’s eyes widening before he snatches his hand away, expression going pinched.

A moment to gloat is all Dick affords himself, grinning at his former protégé not for the first time that night.

“The Manor’s fine Alfred.” Dick assures, throwing an arm over Damian’s stiff shoulders in a relaxed show of solidarity on the mutually agreed upon destination.

“Very good, sirs.” Alfred says, and smoothly pulls the car out into traffic.

Knees splayed, Dick settles himself more comfortably into the town car’s seat— _more_ comfortably, as the car was practically made in the name of comfort, upholstered with leather soft as butter and inset with warming pads for chilly nights like tonight.

God forbid a Wayne should ever want for anything.

From inside the car, Gotham is muted, no wail of sirens screaming down avenues or raucous laughter pealing from rooftops hosting Gotham’s uncostumed nightlife. Dick knows Damian would have much rather been crouched atop a gargoyle for the past three hours—all of them, consecutively—than at the mercy of Gotham’s supposed elite, but there are two sides to being a Wayne. If this is the worst they have to endure tonight, they’ll both be lucky.

The unrelenting stiffness in Damian’s shoulders insists otherwise.

Dick’s palm covers Damian’s shoulder, giving him a little shake. “Hey, come on, it wasn’t that bad.”

A grunt is all Dick gets in response, and maybe Damian’s taking Dick’s repeated reminders of ‘if you don’t have anything nice to say don’t say anything at all’ to heart, but the look he cuts toward Dick in the dim lighting of the car suggests otherwise. He’s not holding his tongue on any false sense of courtesy; he just doesn’t know where to begin.

“What?” Dick asks, not quite sure where this intensity is coming from. “Did Vicki Vale manage to corner you?”

“Tt.” Damian snorts, flicking his eyes away in an arrogant approximation of an eye-roll.

“Alright then,” Dick smiles, leaning into his protégé’s space, playfully nudging the apple of Damian’s cheek with the tip of his nose. “So what’s got you so wound up? You look like you’re expecting an attack.”

A couple years ago, Dick would have been risking life and limb with such a display; Damian’s knee-jerk resistance to any form of affection a wall Dick has had to pull down brick by painstaking brick. That all Dick gets now at the breach of personal space is a pair of icy blue eyes cast in his direction seems almost unreal.

Of course, a _lot_ can happen in a couple years.

Uncertainty flickers to life in those eyes, a spark as quick and confounding as a low-voltage electrical shock. To anyone else, Damian’s pinched expression would seem appropriately displeased, but not much else; hesitation an indulgence smothered long ago by the usually exasperatingly self-assured teen.

Dick isn’t just _anyone_ to Damian.

“Hey,” Dick’s voice softens in a way he can’t quite help, eyebrows drawing down. “C’mon now, what’s up?”

Damian’s mouth comes dangerously close to fulfilling the necessary parameters of a pout. An intensely displeased scowl, the teen would likely insist. Either way, it’s the first he’s allowed himself all evening.

“We had an agreement.” Damian says, stilted, more an accusation than a reminder although its clear he tries for the latter.

It is Dick’s turn to tense, just slightly, at the corners of his eyes.

“And?” Dick asks, turning over the terms of their arrangement in his head.

Mouth thinning, Damian resolutely maintains eye contact; the temptation to look away no doubt translating through years of training to seem like an intolerable weakness. “Have I not adequately fulfilled the stipulations?”

As much as Dick wishes he could say he hadn’t noticed, he’s never been one to be intentionally duplicitous.

“I don’t think I could have asked you to smile any more.” Dick agrees, a small smile tugging his mouth upwards at the thought.

Although a certain amount of attention is to be expected from any social event attended by a Wayne child, Damian had been positively swamped when he’d entered the gala with his eldest brother and an unheard of, honest-to-god, _smile_. No doubt there are rumors already in circulation, newspapers ready to grace the cover of tomorrow’s papers with the perfect snapshot of the heretofore unheard of phenomena.

More papers sell when there’s a Wayne on the cover.

The only problem Dick can foresee the papers having is figuring out _which_ picture to use. Catching a smile from the usually reserved, if not downright surly, youngest Wayne would normally be enough to send a photographer screaming to their editor in joy, but Damian had kept it up all through the gala. Through every socialite’s story and reporter’s question, every speech and dull moment, Damian had at least attempted to appear pleasant.

Good old-fashioned Wayne Charm had taken care of the rest.

Dick would be lying if he said he wasn’t proud; if he didn’t find himself drifting toward Damian all through the night, drawn in by the very same smile he’d had to bargain for in the first place.

It was worth it, just to have someone to look for in the crowd, a sharp little grin to fall back on when his started to feel false around the edges.

“Then you’re a liar.” Damian’s hands are curled into fists atop his knees, the skin above his knuckles pulled tight and white.

“What? No.” Dick denies, confused. “No I’m not.”

Damian glowers up at him from under the perpetually heavy furrow of his brow. “You said if I was polite and smiled while accompanying you tonight, I would be rewarded.”

He _had_ said that, and he meant it, but he’d meant to reward Damian when they were _alone_ —not necessarily the second they were alone together.

“Right now?” Dick asks, casting a glance to the front of the car where the privacy glass is still very much down. The back of Alfred’s head is a silent, unassuming presence observing only the flow of traffic and Dick wonders, not for the first time, if it was really Bruce who taught them how to blend in.

Quick on the uptake, Damian identifies the hindrance and takes the situation into his own hands. Silently, without warning or hesitation, he’s across the town car and holding his thumb to the button that raises the privacy window, completely unfazed by the boldness of the act. The normally hushed whirring of the window mechanism is agonizingly loud in the quiet of the car, Alfred disappearing bit by bit behind the blacked out partition, creating the illusion of privacy.

Releasing the button from under his thumb with his customary air of curtness, Damian’s brow wings upwards, as if to say _well?_

He stays on the other side of the car, just out of Dick’s comfortable reaching distance, and of course, Damian would make this difficult. Of course he wants Dick to prove this, just like he’s had to prove everything else; that this isn’t just Damian asking, but Dick wanting.

Dick bites the inside of his cheek but it does little to keep the smile from sneaking onto his face.

“Okay. You’re right.” Dick shakes the wrinkles out of his jacket, straightening the sleeves before plucking the cufflinks from his cuffs with nimble fingers. Details interest Damian, and Dick is still testing the weight of Damian’s stare when it comes to this; anticipation like a fever spike from across the car as he deposits the expensive baubles in a cup holder. “You were great in there.”

“As if my ability to navigate the dimwitted was up to debate.” Damian sniffs, falling back on the comfort of rudeness as a blush creeps over the tips of his ears.

Ignoring Damian’s words for the way he swallows the bite that should accompany his thinly veiled insult, throat working the delicate cartilage of his adam’s apple up and down, Dick holds his hand out between them, palm up.

Damian’s glower is punishment for making him ask. A warning, that he needn’t act and _won’t_ if this is what Dick calls charity. A reminder that, of the two of them, one has gone much longer without the comfort of touch, of kindness, than the other—and that practice makes perfect.

They both know better than to call it what it is; hope tangled helplessly with hesitation.

“Damian.” Dick leans forward and scoots to the edge of his seat, tangling his fingers with Damian’s. “C’mere.”

He doesn’t need to tug for Damian to follow, pulled to Dick’s side by the deliberateness of his touch not the force of his hold.

Why Damian doesn’t land in Dick’s lap, when the invitation was so clearly there, baffles Dick for a moment, the acrobat unused to said suggestion being spurned. The hand in his squeezes, fingers still twined together even if Damian is looking at him with a degree of defiance, and Dick can puzzle the pieces together.

Smiling, Dick keeps Damian’s attention as he leans in, gaze dropping to his mouth for a moment, just long enough that when he glances up again, Damian’s look has softened to something more frustrated than angry. Close enough to see the tips of Damian’s eyelashes, Dick entertains the idea of kissing the aggravation from his former protégé until he’s breathless and wanting and all arguments are either forgiven or forgotten.

It wouldn’t be the first time.

But that’s a tactic best saved for qualms Dick doesn’t have the ability to resolve easily, and Dick squeezes Damian’s hand before he leans their foreheads together. “You made me very proud.”

Damian nudges Dick’s head in warning, on his way to being placated and unhappy to be so easily read. “Don’t patronize me.”

“I’m not,” Dick moves with the nudge, leaning in to brush the tip of his nose against Damian’s. “Do you know how good you look when you smile?”

Dick closes his eyes, as if bringing the image to mind; revealing that he has an image of Damian he’s committed to memory. Damian’s face burns, equal parts pleased and embarrassed.

His free hand finds the jut of Damian’s jaw, blind save for the memory of the action, and Dick leans forward. When Damian moves to meet him halfway, Dick pulls back a breath’s width, tasting the want between them the way he was taught to sample the finest wines.

His heart twists at the unguarded _want_ on Damian’s face, and his thumb brushes the corner of Damian’s mouth. “Smile?”

“I’ve pandered to this request enough.” Damian grumbles, frustration twisting the syllables into something dangerously close to a whine.

Impatient, Damian leans in, clumsy with his want. Dick knows this game, and he plays it well, keeping Damian at bay.

“Please?” Dick asks, tracing the flushed skin of Damian’s cheek. “For me?”

Its Damian’s turn to close his eyes, purposefully shutting Dick and all the distraction he presents out. The corners of Damian’s eyes pinch and Dick can feel the tensing of Damian’s forehead from where they’re touching. Dick draws back enough to see the furrow in Damian’s brow, compromise ready on his tongue, still close enough to feel the measured inhale Damian draws.

In the dim lighting of the car, Damian’s teeth are a flash of white, small and severe and presented like a secret.

This could turn out to be the worst discovery Dick’s ever made.

Soft and dry, Damian’s mouth is a heady deception that Dick is more than willing to lose himself in. They kiss the way they spar, Dick leading with playful nips and a natural, enthusiastic flair, while Damian surges up, meeting Dick’s every move, surpassing every expectation with eager determination. Damian swallows Dick’s kisses like they’re more substantial than Dick’s ever realized, as if he could slake himself on this alone. He bites at Dick’s lips as if he means to keep some of his mentor for himself; swallows down his breathy noises like precious water to a parched man’s throat.

A kiss can’t be just a kiss between them, not when Damian’s hand is fisted in Dick’s lapel, an anchor meant to keep one of them from drifting away, his mouth as demanding now as it was when he was younger and so, _so_ determined to prove himself. Dick slides his hand around the back of Damian’s neck and inclines his head, drawing the kiss to the corner of his mouth for Damian’s sake. He remembers the boy Damian used to be. Disagreeable and displaced; desperate in a different way, but hungrier for the attention he would never ask for. This is Dick’s proof, his give to Damian’s take.

Damian’s hand is a guiding force on Dick’s jacket, pulling him back to where he has easy access to the whole of his mouth.

It’s always a chase with them, an endless tug of war, because that’s how Damian was raised and Dick’s always cared too much to back down. The flat edges of Damian’s teeth catch on Dick’s upper lip, dragging across as if a reminder of their presence. Dick dips his tongue past Damian’s lips, tasting and goading and asking permission and he knows its all in the wrong order but he loves keeping Damian on his toes. In that warm, wet mouth, Damian welcomes Dick like a trespasser, his tongue blunt and hot, and Dick pulls back to suck a breath in.

Victory and lust twist Damian’s kiss bruised lips upward in a triumphant smirk, and Dick knows patrol is going to be _hell_ tonight.

Lungs renewed, Dick swoops back in before Damian can cause any more damage to his mental image of Robin. It’s probably not the best tactic, given that Damian meets him halfway with a low, needy sound that Dick may or may not already associate with the smell of sweat and grappling mats. Dick feigns pulling away again and earns himself a warning growl when Damian reels him back with a talented bit of lip work. Playing with the soft hairs where they come to a point at the back of Damian’s neck, Dick takes his time reacquainting himself with Damian’s lips, smiling into Damian’s mouth when the teen gets frustrated and tries to goad Dick into something more like a fight.

When he leads Damian into a series of quick, light kisses, Damian is panting and Dick isn’t exactly composed. The barely-there brush of their lips between breaths is the best kind of tease, a promise and a reminder, and Dick has wanted to do this all night.

“You’re so pretty,” Dick presses a kiss to Damian’s greedy mouth, only to be bitten by incensed little teeth.

Damian’s nowhere near gone enough to react positively to that kind of praise; still buttoned up and aware of himself enough to deny how much he wants to lean back and open himself for such sweet words of adoration. He’s young, and he still has all these expectations—of himself, of others, of how things _should_ be. He still has all these parts that Dick gets to peel back and sink his fingers into; the part that aches for something more than perfection, and the part that sings under Dick’s fingertips.

“Fine, _handsome_.” Dick concedes, angling for Damian’s top lip.

“Grayson.” Damian growls, and Dick applies himself to making Damian lose his no doubt disparaging train of thought. Either he almost manages, or Damian simply takes advantage of Dick’s intent, tilting his head back and readily giving into the renewed fervor of Dick’s attentions. When Dick pulls back, Damian’s reply is breathy and delayed, his tone nowhere near as annoyed as it should be. “You’re talking too much." 

Dick grins, ducking in to press an open mouthed kiss to the side of Damian’s mouth.

“Oh? Am I distracting you?” Dick asks, tracing his tongue along the seam of Damian’s mouth, pulse thundering when Damian’s warm, pink tongue slips defiantly past his lips. Nudging Damian’s cheek with his nose, Dick steals another sloppy kiss, pulling back to tease Damian the best way he knows how. “Can’t you concentrate when I’m telling you how good you look?”

Making Damian blush is a dangerous game, but its one Dick loves to play all the same.

“Or how perfect I think you are?” He punctuates each question with a kiss, a reminder of his taste and the veracity of his words. “Or how much I’ve wanted to do this?”

Strong, small hands frantically find their way to either side of Dick’s head, burying fingers in his hair and fisting there as Damian pulls himself against Dick. He means to kiss the smile off Dick’s face, means to suck the honey straight off his tongue, and Dick opens his mouth to let Damian have his way—but mostly he means to shut Dick up. Dick’s praise is exactly what Damian wants, but it’s humiliating how little of it he needs before he completely embarrasses himself.

Dick’s hands find Damian’s waist, the firm muscle of his abdomen and the eager way his slim hips jerk against Dick’s palms. When the world starts to spin, Dick holds Damian still with a firm grasp, gasping for breath around Damian’s lips.

Thankfully, Damian slows the kiss down, knocking his knee against Dick’s when he dips his tongue past Dick’s lips. They’re pressed together all along Dick’s thigh and if Dick had all of his wits about him he wouldn’t be pulling Damian into his lap, but Dick’s busy with Damian’s tongue in his mouth right now and he honestly can’t think of a better place for the teen to be.

The grip on his hair turns painful and Dick pulls back, turning his head away when Damian follows.

“Ow, ow Dami- gentle.” Dick hisses, touching Damian’s elbow. Damian’s grip loosens, marginally, and Dick smiles at him, entranced by the labored rise and fall of his chest. “We’re both gonna be sorry if you rip my hair out. Bald isn’t a look I’m ready to rock.”

Damian’s nose wrinkles. “Ew.”

Laughing at Damian’s candidness, Dick lets his hands wander back to Damian’s hips, nimble fingers sneaking past the jacket to where the crisp white of his shirt tucks neatly into his pants. Like most of their schmoozing clothes, these pants were tailor-made for Damian and they hug his legs like they’re thankful to have the chance. Dick’s hands wander down the outer seam, to where his knees sink into the seat on either side of Dick’s thighs, and lightly up the backs of his legs.

“Don’t be mean.” Dick warns, light, more affectionate than chastising.

Damian’s mouth twists, like he’s keeping a perfectly valid response from leaping out, but he’s glowing with a whole body flush and his lips are kissed something raw and Dick thinks he could really use something else to occupy himself with; namely, Dick’s mouth. Pulling Damian closer with both hands on his ass, Dick leans in and swallows whatever Damian had meant to say. Sweet and slow, Dick leads them through a meandering kiss, close enough now that the need to crawl into each other has ebbed somewhat.

Dick’s fingers inch up, past the pert curve of his ass and past the sleek leather strip of Damian’s belt, warmed by the heat pouring off his body and accumulating inside his jacket. He’s quick to still Damian’s hips when the teen presses forward, seeking Dick’s friction. Damian’s groan is too pitiful to pass as a convincing growl and Dick takes pity on him, tilting his head back to yield control of the kiss.

Seamlessly, Damian takes over, caught as much in the pull of the kiss building between them as he is in the natural tendency to pick up where Dick’s left off. It’s always been about give and take between them, and Damian is a comfortable weight in Dick’s lap.

Picking at the wrinkles in Damian’s shirt, Dick works at it until he’s freed a single rumpled tail of Damian’s meticulously tailored oxford. Dick’s fingers linger.

He should really move his hand elsewhere…

The hem of Damian’s shirt is a boundary, a ledge upon which Dick’s fingers teeter, as if committed to touching each stitch. He jumps, because he was raised on adrenaline and daring, and Damian feels like every ledge Dick’s ever leapt off of; dangerous, like giving into free-fall. Damian’s stomach is warm to the touch, firm and reactive as Dick skims his fingers over the sensitive flesh, unspeakably greedy for the comfort of Damian so alive and substantial above him.

Blunt nails dig into Dick’s shoulders, and he’s distantly grateful for the layers of cloth preventing Damian from drawing blood.

Leaning into the cushion of his seat, Dick drinks Damian in, breathless and thoroughly debauched and so very smug in Dick’s lap. This is more than Dick promised, but probably not more than he intended when he’d agreed to Damian’s terms. Dick smiles, touching his teeth to his kiss-swollen bottom lip just to feel the drag of it, and wonders if Damian knew.

Damian’s eyes darken, his laser focus on Dick’s mouth, and he’s beautiful, in the way all uncertain things are. He’s a trained and tempered assassin, flesh and bone and blood, and Dick’s seen all of it, held him together with the same hands currently taking him apart.

Restraint is highly overrated.

One of them moves first, Dick thinks it might have been Damian, even if that doesn’t quite explain how Damian’s suddenly pressed flush to Dick, Damian’s fingers digging into the knot of Dick’s tie as Dick’s fingertips search out the scar tissue along Damian’s spine—when the sharp rap of knuckles on glass jerks them apart. Dick looks past Damian, to where the privacy glass is still up, but that’s presupposing Alfred needs to _see_ anything to _know_ its happening.

Dick blushes with the realization that the car isn't moving, isn't even _on_ any longer, and gives in to an embarrassed fit of giggles, despite the glare he gets from Damian. Apparently, they're home. 

Crawling off Dick’s lap, Damian adjusts himself and jabs the button that allows communication between driver and passenger.

“What _is_ it Pennyworth?” Damian snaps, shooting a glare at Dick when his giggles renew themselves.

“Terribly sorry, Master Damian.” Alfred intones, without the slightest air of apology. “Master Bruce would like to know if you or Master Richard will be accompanying him on patrol tonight.”

Its criminal how smarmy Alfred can sound while keeping perfectly professional.

Damian looks momentarily murderous, and Dick is so wholly endeared that he briefly contemplates telling Bruce they’ll catch up with him. There’s no better way to ensure Damian bolts out of the car, straight for his cape and boots, but it’s a nice thought.

“Inform my Father that if he wishes to pass his wearisome social obligations off on his sons, he could at least have the decency to wait for us to suit up.”

“Very well, sir.” Alfred says, followed soon after by the muffled sound of Alfred exiting the car.

When Damian turns around, ready to return to the back of the car with his kiss bruised mouth set in a familiar downward tilt, he pauses, eyes narrowing.

“What?” He snaps, wary of the wide grin Dick’s sporting.

Dick honestly can’t help the smile. “You called me your brother.”

Damian rolls his eyes. “I did not.”

“You definitely did.” Dick’s smile spreads, as if fueled by Damian’s denials.

“Grayson.” Damian’s mouth thins, and it couldn’t be more obvious that someone’s been kissing him. Dick must have let his mind wander, because Damian is suddenly beside him, fingertips on Dick’s jaw and eyes sharp, already committed to the prospect of patrol. Damian doesn’t exactly try to hide the way he looks at Dick, it’d be silly, all things considered, but he doesn’t have the boldness to linger, appraising Dick’s features perfunctorily before removing his hand. “Don’t make this weird.”

If Dick’s cheek tingles when Damian turns to exit the car, Damian doesn’t give him enough time to acknowledge it.

“Hey,” Dick catches Damian’s wrist, the teen already half out of the car and all sober adjustments to his disheveled appearance. It takes everything Dick has not to pull him back into the car, where he’s safe and happy and all Dick’s.

Instead, Dick loosens his hold and smiles, a small, inviting thing meant just for Damian. “Let’s go get some bad guys.”

Damian ducks his head, his face hidden from all but one set of eyes.


End file.
